There is no end to the promotion. There is no end to the possibilities. You can continue to promote a book for years, literally.

I try to remember that the job - as well as the plight, and the unexpected joy - of the artist is to embrace uncertainty, to be sharpened and honed by it.

It is in the thousands of days of trying, failing, sitting, thinking, resisting, dreaming, raveling, unraveling that we are at our most engaged, alert, and alive.

Writing has been my window-flung wide open to this magnificent, chaotic existence-my way of interpreting everything within my grasp.

Everything you need to know about life can be learned from a genuine and ongoing attempt to write

If I dismiss the ordinary—waiting for the special, the extreme, the extraordinary to happen - I may just miss my life.

I do whatever is necessary in order to maintain the equanimity we all need to withstand the disappointment and rejection that are the lot of every writer, no matter where we are in our careers.

The only graceful thing to do is recognize and embrace what is actually happening, rather than fight against it.

My desk is covered with talismans: pieces of rose quartz, wishing stones from a favorite beach.

How do we live the writer's life? There's only one simple answer: 'we write.'

If you are a writer or any kind of artist, if you change something as fundamental as where you live - the way you live - then I think you change the very instrument that is trying to make the art

She let out a laugh, and then she put her hand over her mouth, like she was angry at herself for forgetting her sadness.

that you will become entrapped in someone else’s recent careless thoughts.

It is a perfect deception when you can lie to yourself and believe it. You cannot love two people the same. One will always fall by the shadows…even if that one is you.

This was good, except that now I had two crazed, burning zombies standing between me and the exit, plus another one that wasn’t on fire. I had not thought this plan through at all.

The most important thing in marriage is not happiness but stability.

I think beauty comes from actually knowing who you are. That's real beauty to me.

William McKinley has surely been underrated - in no small part because he was succeeded by a memorable leader, Theodore Roosevelt.

I also read about Heathcliff's unexpected three-year career in Hollywood under the name Buck Stallion and his eventual return to the pages of Wuthering Heights.

I actually love woodworking. I'm just getting into it. And I love playing guitar, I'm a big movie aficionado, and I like hiking.

Never interrupt me when I'm eating a banana.